Rented Grave

As a book reviewer, I received a copy of this book for free from the publisher or author to facilitate this review. I received no other compensation, and all opinions are always 100% my own.

Old sins cast long shadows in this gripping novel set in 2003 Hong Kong. A teeming city where land is at a premium and new construction sprouts seemingly overnight, Hong Kong was a place to forget the deprivations and atrocities of China’s Cultural Revolution and start anew. Many people came with nothing, swimming over from the mainland, and yet managed to build successful careers.

Horace Yang is one who made that swim, but has not found that success. He’s frustrated with his work as an account manager, getting calls about backed-up toilets and leaky ACs at all hours of the day and night, and he’s the type to take out that frustration on his family. He nurses the idea of revenge for a crime committed in Beijing during the 1960s, but his attempt to carry it out leaves a chauffeur dead, and Horace with a kidnapped child to deal with.

The intended victim, Mo Tun, is one of those who succeeded and now has a hand in many of Hong Kong’s shadier enterprises. Mo Tun is sure that his kidnapped grandson is being held because of his work with the Triads gangs, and hides even the fact of the kidnapping from the police. The sound of a Beijing accent on a ransom phone call sends him on a search for people from his old life, including the Chief Superintendent with whom he has a shared history.

All these hidden stories weave their lies and complications around the death of the chauffeur, which is being investigated by Detective Inspector Herman Lok and his team. Lok is an interesting character, in love with his wife but spending a fair amount of time with a much younger woman. He is a sharp detective with a keen eye for details, and inexorably he and his team inch closer to the truth.

Rented Grave is a gripping police procedural populated with memorable characters. Additionally, it gives its readers a glimpse into a real time and place, where the city almost takes on a life of its own. Highly recommended.

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Author Bio:

Charles Philipp Martin grew up in New York City’s Greenwich Village. His father was an opera conductor and both his parents well-known opera translators and librettists who never uttered the word “parenting” but knew enough to steep their family in music and literature. After attending Columbia University and Manhattan School of Music, Martin took off for a six-year paid vacation in the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra.

While in Hong Kong he hung up his bow and turned to writing, spending four years as a Sunday Magazine columnist for the South China Morning Post, and writing for magazines all over Southeast Asia. His weekly jazz radio show 3 O’Clock Jump was heard every Saturday on Hong Kong’s Radio 3 for some two decades.

Neon Panic, a suspense novel which introduced Hong Kong policeman Inspector Herman Lok, was published in 2011. His most recent novel is Rented Grave, the first in a new series featuring Inspector Herman Lok. Martin now lives in Seattle with his wife Catherine.